Thompson Letter on GPRA - NRC
August 17, 1999
The Honorable Greta Joy Dicus
Chairman
Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Washington, DC 20555
Dear Chairman Dicus:
As you know, the Congress is focused on ensuring that the federal government delivers better results to its citizens and taxpayers. The Congress has enacted a statutory framework to achieve these results. This statutory framework includes the Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA); financial management statutes, such as the Chief Financial Officers Act; and information resources management statutes, such as the Clinger-Cohen Act. Each of these reforms aims at achieving more efficient and effective performance throughout the federal government.
As part of our oversight agenda, the Committee has developed information on how effectively the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is using the above statutory tools to improve performance in several key areas such as becoming more results-oriented and resolving long-standing problems of fraud, waste, and mismanagement. The purpose of this letter is to share with you the information we have developed and obtain your response to certain questions pertaining to it. With this dialog as a start, we hope to work with you on a continuing basis to ensure that NRC delivers the best possible results for the government and the American people.
Performance plan assessment
The Congress continues to look closely at how well departments and agencies are implementing GPRA. At the request of this Committee and others, GAO recently completed an assessment of NRC’s annual performance plan for fiscal year (FY) 2000. According to GAO, NRC’s plan "provides a general discussion of intended performance across the agency and of strategies and resources the agency will use to achieve its goals." GAO continues, however, to criticize the fact that "the plan focuses on strategies, not outcomes and provides limited confidence to judge the credibility of performance information because it is incomplete and lacks specificity."
The FY 2000 plan’s major strengths are that it contains measurable goals and quantifiable measures, discusses strategies and resources for achieving intended performance, and discusses crosscutting functions and external factors.
GAO found that the FY 2000 plan had several key weaknesses. These include the fact that the plan focuses on strategies, rather than outcomes, as well as the fact that it does not show how achieving strategies and outputs will contribute to meeting performance goals and that it lacks details to determine that performance information is credible.
Need to implement audit recommendations on major management problems
Like many other agencies in the federal government, NRC has been plagued by mismanagement. GAO identifies a number of major management challenges that affect NRC. I am particularly concerned with outstanding recommendations to solve issues of safety at the country’s nuclear plants.
GAO has recommended that NRC develop strategies to act more aggressively on safety deficiencies when the are discovered. This recommendation included the suggestion that NRC require inspection reports to fully document the status of each licensee’s actions to address identified problems under NRC’s correction action requirements.
NRC must be prepared to act on the many substantive, constructive recommendations made to solve such problems. Attached, you will find a number of recommendations made by GAO to address major management problems at NRC.
Need for specific performance goals to address major management problems
I recognize that many major management problems are complex and will take time to resolve. However, it is essential that agency heads and other managers commit themselves to tangible steps that will eventually lead to solutions and that they accept accountability for following through on these commitments. One obvious way to do this is to establish specific and measurable goals in your annual GPRA performance plans. Indeed, Office of Management and Budget (OMB) guidance implementing GPRA states:
Performance goals for management problems should be included in the annual plan, particularly for problems whose resolution is mission-critical, or which could potentially impede achievement of program goals . . .
In its review of NRC’s FY 2000 performance plan, GAO evaluated the extent to which the plan contains specific performance goals to address the most serious management problems confronting NRC that GAO and your IG have identified. According to the GAO evaluation, which is detailed in an enclosure, NRC’s FY 2000 performance plan does not include performance goals for the following areas identified as major management challenges:
- NRC’s culture and organizational structure impede effective action;
- developing information management systems and being able to anticipate and measures the benefits to be gained;
- responding to the impact of industry deregulation and license transfers;
- administering and overseeing agency procurement under government contracting rules;
- effectively communicating with the public and industry;
- maintaining an unqualified financial statement opinion in light of new and existing Chief Financial Officer requirements;
- refocusing NRC’s research program to reflect a mature industry; and
- responding to the external influences for changing NRC’s operations.
I am concerned about the absence of specific and measurable goals for these major management challenges. Without specific and measurable performance goals, it is difficult if not impossible to assess progress in addressing major management problems and to hold agencies accountable. For the reasons stated above, the absence of goals to resolve many of the aforementioned outstanding recommendations is inexcusable.
Congressional follow-up
With so many tax dollars being wasted, this Committee expects agencies to take every opportunity to use the many tools available to them, such as GPRA plans, to resolve major management problems. Furthermore, the GAO and your own IG exist to work in partnership with you to solve longstanding issues of waste, fraud, and abuse.
I hope that the information provided with this letter will stimulate you to make greater use of these tools and resources. In this regard, I ask that you review the enclosed information and respond to the following questions:
- Do you disagree with any of the designations of management problems facing NRC? If so, which ones and why?
- Where you agree with the problem designations, are you prepared to establish specific and measurable commitments to address each one of them in your next performance plan?
- If so, could you outline preliminarily what approach you plan to take for each problem?
- If you believe that any of these problems do not lend themselves to specific and measurable performance plan goals, please explain why. Please also explain what alternative steps you are taking to solve the problem.
I would appreciate your early attention to this letter. After receiving your response, I will ask Committee staff to arrange a meeting with your representatives to discuss it. My Governmental Affairs Committee staff contact is Robert Shea.
Sincerely,
Fred Thompson
Chairman
FT/rs
Enclosures
